The Philosophy of History, Vol. 2 of 2

by Friedrich von Schlegel

the same security, nor possess the same durability, as the great, fundamental treaty of Westphalia. Yet both in France and abroad, this measure, so appalling to the whole European world, was, after so long an interval, extremely unexpected. One of the effects of this measure was a cruel war of extermination carried on in the mountains of the Cevennes against the Protestants, who appear to have there derived a part of their tenets from some of the earlier sects of the middle age. With respect to the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, considering it merely as an act of authority, and independently of the blow which it gave to the establishment of a permanent religious peace, we can only say that such an abuse of power on the part of the majority, (and it is to the influence of a preponderant majority this act was ascribed by public opinion,) such an abuse of power was a very dangerous precedent in the native land of all violent reactions; and thus in our days the emigration of the French nobility has been the great historical counter-blow to the banishment of the Hugonots.

This violent expulsion of the Protestants could not even accomplish the immediate object of its authors; for the spirit of Protestantism had struck much too deep roots in France; and the evil could not be removed by mere physical force, and without the application of a moral remedy. The Protestant influence of French Switzerland was not destroyed, and indeed it

became still more powerful in the sequel; while a far deeper wound was inflicted on the Catholic cause in France by the spread of Jansenistical principles from the Netherlands, which, supported as those principles were by great literary talents, exerted then a mighty influence over the French nation. The essence of Jansenism was the Rationalism of Calvin, combined with feelings of pietism, and covered over with a deep varnish of Catholicism. It was not the small party of the Jansenists of Utrecht, excluded as they were from the church, and completely separated from the two great religious parties of Europe, that could injure the Catholic cause in France; but it was that modified or disguised Jansenism which had crept into the very bosom of the Gallican church, and there grew up in secret, that was most to be feared. All these partial or disguised influences of the spirit of Protestantism derived their full sanction from the theory of a Gallican church, such as it was proclaimed by the supreme authority in the state. In the Protestant constitution of England, indeed, the principle of a National church, like the Anglican, (however such a principle may be opposed to the very essence and fundamental maxims of Christianity), is not inconsistent with the origin and general doctrines of that church. But in the Catholic church, where the principle of national dissent is not admissible to a like extent, such a system is perfectly absurd, and carries with it its own refutation.

The older theory of a Germanic church cannot be here adduced as an historical precedent; for that theory was started with a view to regulate the external relations of the church, or to fix with more precision the limits of the Papal and Imperial power, but did not refer to matters of doctrine, or to the internal discipline of the church. Yet with this system of a Germanic church, in the period of the Ghibelline ascendancy, many errors were mixed up—the first germs of the schism afterwards consummated. But this disguised, half-schism of the Gallican church, not less fatal in its historical effects than the open schism of the Greeks, has contributed very materially towards the decline of religion in France, down to the period of the Restoration. It was not only the dispute with Rome, which Louis XIV. carried to such fearful extremes; but the alliances he so frequently renewed with the Swedish conqueror, and with the Turkish power (still so formidable to the whole of Christendom), which must, as coming from a Catholic quarter, have given much scandal to the age; and we must at least allow that the foreign policy of Lewis XIV. was scarcely in any respect Christian, and that it prepared the way for that relaxation of moral and religious principles which took place in France under his feebler successors. Lewis XIV. undoubtedly well knew how to strengthen his regal prerogative, and render it more absolute, and in this work, like several of his predecessors, evinced

the most systematic art, and the greatest determination of character. But all the great problems of that age—all the religious questions which then divided the world, which forming as they did the highest object of all practical reflection and conduct were then so warmly agitated, could not be brought to a permanent, adequate, and generally satisfactory solution by the capricious mandates of power, or the partial adjudications of regal authority. And if in this establishment of absolute power in the interior, no regard is paid to the lawful rights either of Foreign nations, or of the people at home, what security is there that such a system will or can endure?

The splendour of the then French literature is one of the main pillars on which the glory of that reign and century depends—this literature which attained so high a degree of perfection, contains however to some extent the germs of that political scepticism, and those religious errors, which led to the disasters of subsequent times. An Æsthetic cristicism of pure art, falls not within the limits of the plan I have traced out to myself, and I can notice subjects of this nature only inasmuch as they serve to denote the character of particular ages and nations. As in no country was the spirit of the middle age—the scholastico-romantic character of the first period of European cultivation, both in the tone of feeling and the mode of expression so long preserved, nor raised to such a state of high

refinement and beautiful perfection, as in Spain; so we may say that the peculiar characteristic of the French mind in the age of Lewis XIV. consisted in a studious and minute avoidance of the two principal defects in the intellectual productions of the middle age—the scholastic vagueness and obscurity in works of speculation on the one hand, and the fantastic wildness in works of imagination on the other. That choice and exquisite taste which prevails in all those models of secular and clerical, historical, poetical, and philosophic eloquence, which that age produced in such abundance, originated in this species of precision averse from all excess and obscurity. And it was by the clearness and lightness it owed to this principle that the French language became, in the eighteenth century, the universal model and most convenient medium, not only of conversation, but of epistolary communication, among the polite classes of all European nations. But in a comprehensive survey of general literature, this standard of a pleasing style must not be considered as universally applicable, or higher than any other; and without wishing to compare objects totally dissimilar in themselves, I may observe that although among all the classical writers and orators of that age, Bossuet is the greatest in point of style, and at the same time the most solid and intellectual, yet the naive loquacity and infantine simplicity which distinguish the incorrect, old French diction of St. Francis of Sales,

are peculiarly graceful and attractive in themselves; while in the depth and clearness of the ascetic spirit, the Saint far surpasses the former writer more celebrated in the world.

In the regular philosophy of the schools, the Latin was mostly the prevailing language during the seventeenth century. In this the system of Descartes then formed an epoch; or at least obtained very general credit. His fanciful vortices in nature, as well as his rigid demonstration by reason, of that principle which is exalted above all reason, comprise rather the first germ of the various errors in the physics and metaphysics of the succeeding age, than a sound basis of true science, and a Christian philosophy of the human mind. Spinoza was the immediate disciple of Descartes, but it is in Germany alone that his rationalist system of pantheism, expressed as it is in the forms of mathematical demonstration, and embellished by a morality pure and noble, (at least in appearance and in its general outline,) has been justly appreciated in its true metaphysical import, and has found philosophic critics and imitators. But in its negative bearings, the philosophy of Spinoza, together with other writings by that inquirer and others on and against revelation, had a very extensive influence in those times; and that philosophy forms the notable point of transition to the metaphysical speculations of our own age. Socinus had directed his attacks against the great mystery in the existence of the living God—the

Christian dogma of the Trinity. In the system of Spinoza, philosophic Protestantism, or the progressive spirit of negation, advanced one step further; for he denied the personal existence, or the living personality of God, and endeavoured to substitute for the notion of the God-head the empty idea of the Infinite.